sturtevant's notes on edible plants 545 



S. topiro Hiunb. & Bonpl. turkey berry. 



Banks of the Orinoco. The berry is edible.' 

 S. torvum Sw. 



CosmopoHtan tropics. West Indies to Peru. This species is shrubby with yellow, 

 spherical berries of good size which seem wholesome.* 

 S. trilobatum Linn. 



Tropical Asia. The leaves are eaten by the Hindus.* 

 S. tuberosum Linn, potato. 



Western South America. A native of southern Chile, becoming an object of cultiva- 

 tion in northern Chile and Peru in the time of the Incas.'' Mueller ^ says the potato is 

 foimd wild also in Argentina. Darwin ' states that the wild potato now grows on the 

 islandF of the Chonos Archipelago in great abundance, on the sandy, shelly soil near the 

 sea beach. The tubers were generally small, but he found one of oval shape two inches 

 in diameter, resembling in every respect and having the same smell as English potatoes. 

 When boiled, these potatoes shrunk much and were watery and insipid, without any bitter 

 taste. They grow as far south as latitude 50 and are called aquinas by the wild Indians 

 of that part. Frezier,' 1732, speaks of the potatoes of the Chile Indians as called by them 

 papas and as being quite insipid in taste. 



According to Hvunboldt,* the potato was cultivated at the time of the discovery of 

 America in all the temperate regions of Chile to New Granada but not in Mexico. The 

 earliest mention of the potato, if it be not the sweet potato, is that of Peter Martyr, who, 

 referring to the time of Coliunbus' voyages, says that the Indians of Darien " dygge also 

 out of the grounds certayne rootes growing of themselves, which they call betatas, muche 

 lyke unto the navie rootes of Millane, or the great pufies or mushroomes of the earth. 

 Howsoever they be dressed, eyther fryed or sodde, they geve place to no suche kyude of 

 meate in pleasant tendemes. The skinne is somewhat tougher than eyther the navies 

 or mushromes, and of earthy colour, but the inner meate thereof is very white: These 

 are nourished in gardens. . . . They are also eaten rawe and have the taste of rawe 

 chestnuts but are somewhat sweeter." In 1519, Pigafetta Vicentia, the chronicler of the 

 voyage of Magellan, says, on the coast of Brazil, 20 south, the natives brought the Span- 

 iards baskets of potatoes, or " batates," a root resembling " turnips, and tasted like 

 chestnuts," but these may have been the sweet potato. 



In I5S3. Peter Cieca ' says the inhabitants of Peru and vicinity had a tuberous root 

 which they eat and call papas. Cieza de Leon,"" who traveled between 1532 and 1550, 



Don, G. Hist. Dichl. Pis. 4:410. 1838. 

 Mueller, F. Sel. Pis. ^62. 1891. 

 'Ainslie, W. Mat. Ind. 2:427. 1826. 



* Pickering, C. Chron. Hist. Pis. 660. 1879. 

 Mueller, F. Sel. Pis. 462. 189 1. 



Darwin, C. Voy. H. M. S. Beagle 285. 1845. 

 ' Frezier i?e/. Koy. 61. 1732. 



DeCandoUe, A. Geog. Bot. 2:810. 1855. 

 McAdam, R. S. Journ. Agr. 5:323. 1835. 



" Markham, C. R. Trav. Cieza de Leon. Hakl. Soc. Ed. 33:360. 1864. 

 18 



